Digital Audio Broadcasting (DAB) is a digital radio standard for broadcasting digital radio services. DAB is an innovative and universal multimedia broadcast system that is replacing existing AM and FM audio broadcast services in many pails of the world. Compared with the traditional FM and AM broadcasting technology, DAB typically exhibits better audio quality and provides more services at a lower transmission cost.
Besides high-quality digital audio services (mono, two-channel or multichannel stereophonic), DAB can transmit Program Associated Data (PAD) and a multiplex of other data services (e.g., travel and traffic information, still and moving pictures, etc.).
DAB is well suited for mobile reception and provides very high robustness against multipath reception. DAB receivers are used, for example, in infotainments systems of cars.
DAB receivers generally implement error correction techniques to correct errors generated during transmission (from a transmitter to a receiver). For example, some DAB receivers use error correction in a channel decoder such as Viterbi Decoder. However, some residual bit errors may not be corrected. Some DAB receivers may attempt to conceal such residual errors using techniques at a frame level. For example, some DAB receivers mute the receiver output for a duration of a frame containing errors. Other DAB receivers replace (i.e., discard) an erroneous frame with an adjacent frame (i.e., frame repetition), or, in the case of a stereo system, with the frame of the other channel (i.e., frame substitution). DAB receivers implementing error concealment using frame repetition or frame substitution use additional memory to temporarily store decoded frames for use in concealing errors. Another approach is described in U.S. Patent Publication No. 2012/0137189.